Are Vaccine Mandates Justifiable?

MANDATES CAN MAKE SENSE

by Benjamin Wittes

I WILL NOT KNOWINGLY ENGAGE with unvaccinated people in person. I’m happy to do it remotely. I’m not interested in being punitive or stigmatizing, but I’m also not interested in becoming a vector for transmission. And so if somebody tells me that they are not vaccinated, I’m really not interested in being in their presence. I will, of course, make exceptions to that for people who have legitimate medical reasons to not be vaccinated, or for children for whom the vaccine is not approved on an emergency basis. My own personal vaccine mandate is that I don’t choose to socialize in-person with people who are themselves choosing to be vectors for the virus’ transmission.

I think that there